


The thing that should not be

by TheWildOne



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Canon levels of violence, Existential Angst, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Musical References, Musical outbreaks, Other, Spooky sceenes, Unresolved Emotional Tension, heart to heart conversations
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-09-20
Updated: 2013-10-09
Packaged: 2017-12-27 03:14:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 16,771
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/973638
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheWildOne/pseuds/TheWildOne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It had been a hard day for the Winchesters. A hard week actually. Hard due to all the unreleased tension and general lack of productive activity. They have had no news from Kevin in ten days and counting, they were trying to keep themselves busy in the meanwhile, but interesting cases seemed to have developed an unexpected new talent for evading them… But when Castiel breaks into a choreographed rock song at a road bar, the lights of the whole town explode, and this very pregnant woman appears at the door soaked in distress and begging for their help with a brand new monster after her, the Winchesters found themselves busy with one of the most awkward cases they ever had to deal with: musical outbreaks and lots of feelings!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Overture: rock music plays

**Author's Note:**

> This story is placed in season 8, between "Hunteri Heroici" (ep. 8) and "Citizen Fang" (ep. 9).  
> I wrote it due to the insistence of a friend after I told her my ideas for a Supernatural musical episode. The point of it, aside of the joy of randomly music up the show, is dealing with some issues I have had regarding the plot’s consistency with this season and to simply delight myself in writing the characters. 
> 
> Also, I apologise beforehand in case for any problem with the grammar and such. It is frustrating to me, but I am not a native English writer and I am doing my best. Thank you!
> 
> I hope you enjoy it! I will be reading every comment.
> 
>    
> *Music disclaimer:  
> None of the songs in this story belong to me unless specified otherwise. All the songs included and referenced in this story belong to their respective authors and I am making no profit out of their use. There may be minor editions on them in order to fit the plot better, although that has been generally avoided.  
> I am not going to reference the songs until the very end of the work to help the surprise element; it should be easy enough to look them up if you don’t recognise them right away. If this lack of reference presents a problem for you, please let me now.

It had been a hard day. A hard week actually. Hard due to all the unreleased tension and general lack of productive activity. They have had no news from Kevin in ten days and counting, they were trying to keep themselves busy in the meanwhile, but interesting cases seemed to have developed an unexpected new talent for evading them… Two days ago they got a call from Garth alerting them of a possible Shapeshifter or maybe (wishful thinking?) a Leviathan, so they packed all their junk without a second thought and drove almost straight from coast to coast, only find out that their potential Leviathan was not but a disturbing full human dude with a creepy talent for characterisation and a liking for… unorthodox and not-entirely-legal activities. It had taken Dean several full-body shakes to get over the shivers of repugnance, making Sam chuckle slightly over his own disgust.

So, when they decided to try to wash out the frustration by spending some time in the pitiful looking road bar they have driven pass on their way in the town and Castiel materialised in the back seat with one of his unnaturally serene “Hello, Dean. Hello, Sam” salutations, it was practically a miracle what saved Castiel from having his throat stabbed by an adrenaline surplused Sam. On his side, after _not_ crashing the car and complaining very loudly about getting a bell on Cas, Dean could physically tell how these angelic apparitions where cutting his (expectedly short) life shorter and shorter and shorter. Even when, by then, both Sam and Dean, where more than familiar with that singular electric texture that filled the air wherever Castiel was present, giving them subtle never-verbally-acknowledged Goosebumps, there was absolutely no way to get used to that when your job has taught you that killing death anything that shows up unexpected optimises your chances of survival. They were both happy to have Cas there though, so neither of them complained too much.

After a brief update about Jeff’s unchanging situation, the conversation was death, and the boys found themselves dragging the angel along into the tacky lit roadhouse. They get there just in time: a strong wind is starting to blow outside and really dark clouds are gathering. They are certainly not in the mood for driving under a storm, both of them are tired from the driving, tired of waiting, and the voltage of the frustrated action falls upon them in the form of more tiredness.

Dean takes a quick evaluative look around. There is nothing special about the place, just another permutation of the standard model: small, poorly illuminated and smells strongly to cheap booze. It is nearly empty. There’s someone sitting in the booth at the far corner, a young barmaid wearing way too much make up to tell whether she is hot or not behind the squared bar area that takes the central space of the small establishment, someone who looks like a middle aged truck driver is drinking quietly on one of its sides and watching something at the noisy TV at the corner, and a couple is playing pool at the bottom of the room.

They sit on one of the sides of the square, with the door on their backs. At least the music doesn’t suck too much… in Dean’s parameters. One never really knows about Sam’s, who has interiorised so neatly the “shotgun shuts his cakehole” rule that his actual musical liking is better hidden than the location of the Area 51… Which they should look for, eventually. And only God knew about Cas!

Dean can hear Sam trying to pick up a conversation with Cas after they got their drinks, but he doesn’t pay attention, letting his entire mind be absorbed by the beer in front of him without filling it with any particular thought. That is why he completely misses it when, after an undetermined while, the music changes. That is why he also misses how Castiel, who has not touched his beer, raises his head like a watchdog sniffing a prey. And that is why neither he realizes how the angel stands up and leaves the side of his little brother until he feels, like a tingling in his hunter senses, the curiosity with which Sam is following him with his eyes.

Cas is walking around the central square, extremely slowly, but with a strange cadence that is impossible to ignore, attracting the stares from everyone in the room, which is now silent of voices and full of loud rock music. The angel has his eyes closed and his head slightly tilted, like if he is listening at something very carefully.

Dean looks at Sam, asking him without words if he had missed anything, but Sam seems to be as clueless as he is. Before any of them has the time to turn the feeling into a facial expression, Cas, who had reached the side of the square opposed to them, with an abruptness only slightly under the inhuman level of skill, steps on the bar stool and jumps over the counter. He lands sideways and turns to face their direction with a hip drop that makes his coat float dramatically behind him for a couple of seconds. And, with his eyes still closed, he opens his mouth and breaks into a song. 

_Say your prayers little one_

_Don't forget my song_

_To include everyoneeee_

But Cas is not only singing. While keeping the percussion beat with his shoulders, he raises his arms open almost to shoulder level, like if he is holding the whole room.

 Sam starts so violently that he almost stands his absurdly large body up again, and loses half of the drink he is holding in the process. Dean can feel how the blood leaves his face at the same time that the information on how to breathe completely leaks out of his system.

  _I tuck you in_

Cas closes his fists,

_Warm within_

crosses his arms over his chest.

_Keep you free from sin_

_'Til the sandman he comes_

The angel relaxes his arms with calculated slowness, opening them up and letting them unfold to the sides of his body.

 Sam and Dean exchange an alarmed stare for the fraction of a second.

Dean swallows and licks his lips, like he does whenever he tries really hard to collect his thoughts. Dean knows that song, he knows it by heart, and the way Cas is singing sounds nothing alike to James Hetfield’s voice… And nothing alike to how Cas usually speaks either, nor to Jimmy’s… There is something unearthly about the voice, like a funny energy or a second echo in its sound that screams “not-human” in the same inescapable and terrifying way with which Cas’ wings have showed on the walls of that abandoned factory that only time Dean had seen them. The voice is filling the room so intensely that Dean fears it may explode…

_Sleep with one eye open_

He flexes his fingers…

_Gripping your pillow tight_

… and he lets his head fall a little bit to the back, frowning slightly and, only for a second, lifting his upper-lip enough to show his teeth as a brief growl escapes his throat with anticipation, barely holding back the worlds that are struggling to get out.

Castiel’s voice is low, deep and dense, but somehow incredibly clear, and… fierce. Fierce like the way in which he is moving, like if he can barely contain –a little painfully maybe- the energy running through himself. It looks way too much like the way he fights, in those rare occasions since he descended from the Heavens, in which he is allowed to do it as the angel he is: with all his Grace. The parallel that ferocity throws between the way Cas fights and the way he is signing now sends discharge of alarm all throughout Sam’s body. Unsure whether they should do something or not he throws a glance at Dean, who is staring without blinking at the angel like if he had grown a second head and the new anatomical addition was throwing flirty winks at him, pushing himself so aback on the stool that Sam can’t not understand how he has not fell from it on his back.

  _Exit light_

Cas lifts his arms above his head in a very dramatic motion and all of the lights of the room flicker,

_Enter night_

he waves them, crossing his hands above his head in an abrupt motion matched with a frisky hit of his hips as he closes his fists, and all the peripheral lights of the bar explode at once, filling the air with sparkles, and forgiving only the ones around the central square.

 __ Sam jumps up from his seat, his hand unconsciously going to where his gun is hidden.

_Take my hand_

The angel extends his right hand invitingly and, for the first time, Castiel opens his eyes. Yet, he does not look at the boys, but beyond them, at the door. He does it with such an intense stare Sam would not be surprised if the poor wooden thing has spontaneously combusted.

_We're off to never, never-land!_

 And he pulls his hand back, turning around with the flow of the motion, making his trenchcoat float around him. He remains turned for about ten seconds, with his head down, with legs apart, echoing the rhythm in the music with small but decided blows of his hips that can be guessed in the way his big coat moves. And then he begins to walk up and down the length of the counter, again with that strange cadence with which he had begun, although somewhat more violent.

Sam looks at Dean again, who is now half-standing, with the most genuine expression of confusion he has ever seen on his brother. Sam feels his own face frozen in an expression that cannot be but a more stoic variation of the one on dean’s face, his own eyes so dangerously open that he would not be surprised if they fell out of his head at any moment. It is not only that Castiel is signing, which is weird enough, weird as Hell, but that he is also keeping it all impossibly cool for the socially awkward dude he normally is. He glances quickly around the room. Everyone is paying appreciative attention to the show put by Cas, the concerning thing is that nobody seems to be alarmed or surprised at all.

 Cas strides to place himself back to the middle of the counter and turns to face the door again.

 __ Sam is starting to become overly aware of that door.

_Something's wrong, shut the light_

_Heavy thoughts tonight_

Cas lets his hands reach his face and waves slowly in front of it, hiding his eyes for a moment.

_And they aren't of snow white_

He raises his chin in a somehow defiant way and his voice goes a little sore…

_Dreams of war_

_Dreams of lies_

_Dreams of dragons’ fire_

_And of things that will bite, yeah_

… while his opened arms slowly travel back down, like offering an easy prey to everything listed in his words

  _Sleep with one eye open_

He flexes his fingers…

_Gripping your pillow tight_

… and breathes in intensely, loading his voice of power for the upcoming lyrics.

  _Exit light_

The structure of the roadhouse cracks painfully.

Cas lifts his arms above his head and a thunders sounds on the background, somewhere out in the nascent storm

_Enter night_

He waves them, crossing his hands above his head and closing his fists in an abrupt motion matched with his hips. A small explosion sounds outside, leaving only dark pitch darkness coming through the windows

_Take my hand_

The angel extends his left hand towards the door.

_We're off to never never-land_

 And he pulls his hand back, turning around in the flow of the motion, making his trenchcoat float around him. Sam can hear the storm unleashing its fury outside. Cas stays turned around, echoing the percussion with small hits of his body.

 Then, the guy that looks like a truck driver sitting at the left starts singing with low rugged voice:

_Now I lay me down to sleep_

 “Now I lay me down to sleep”, echoes the barmaid who at Castiel´s feet, staring at him in daze.

_Pray the lord my soul to keep_

              “Pray the lord my soul to keep”

_And if I die before I wake_

              “And if I die before I wake”

_Pray the lord my soul to take_

              “Pray the lord my soul to take”

 Cas turns again in one drastic shift that makes all his clothes float around him again, all his attention to the barmaid at his feet. He whispers, yet the voice reaches every corner of the room, with an unexpected sweetness on his voice that grows progressively fiery:

  _Hush little baby don't say a word_

_And never mind that noise you heard_

_It's just the beast under your bed_

_In your closet in your head_

              And he shakes all his body at once, extending his arms wide open.

 Something cracks behind the Winchesters.

  _Exit light_

 The remaining lights flicker violently.

Sam turns in the moment he feels the sudden gust of cold wind on his back. He can see Dean doing the same only an instant later than him.

  _Enter night_

 … There is someone at the door.

 Sam realises that the knife has been in his hands for a while now, Dean’s gun is out.

  _Take my hand_

Cas extends both hands towards the door.

 Through the flickering light Sam sees it all like a sequence of photographs or one of those old silent movies that he never got to watch due to Dean’s lack of cooperation (even though he would probably love them to death). The woman plunges towards him. The distressed expression on her face. His own hand opening and letting the knife fall on the floor. The wetness of her clothes through his own dry ones. Castiel’s eyes on them for the first time since everything went surreal. Her arms around his waist.

‘Please, please, save my baby,’ she begs softly over the roar of the storm and the noise of the music.

 The woman is pregnant.

  _We're off to never never-land!_

The last lights in the room explode, leaving them all in perfect darkness.

 

The music stops.

 

**< TITLE CARD>**


	2. Electric Light Orchestra: Fire On High

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You can find a drawing of the symbol mentioned here [at my blog, in this link](http://rdt-studio.blogspot.com/2013/09/that-sigil.html) .
> 
> Enjoy!

‘The Hell was that man?!’ Dean yells over the storm, starting the Impala even before he is fully seated.

They are not entirely sure what they are running away from. There seems to be no need to rush, for some reason the greatest concern of everyone in the bar seemed to be the sudden blackout. But everything was too damned weird to keep it cool, and the preggie girl is out and soaked. Sam closes the back door with a loud bang after accommodating the fainted girl in the back seat with the help of Cas and rushes to the passenger seat.

 

_Kcab nrut, kcab nrut, kcab nrut ,kcab nrut_

_Ton si emit tub_

_Elbisrever si gnos eht_

 

Gloomily comes from the radio as the motor starts running. Dean looks at Cas through the mirror with apprehension, but the angel is sitting on the far side of the back seat, almost pressed against the door, with his eyes fixed on the unconscious woman. He turns the radio off with obvious annoyance and hits the accelerator.

‘I don’t know, Dean,’ answers Castiel quietly.

‘Dude, you just threw a pro show on the counter of a filthy roadhouse, on a song that is too cool for you to know, blowing up the lights of the whole town in the process. Don’t give me that bullshit! … And I swear that I saw the barmaid trying to fit a bill in your belt as we left!’

‘Is she ok?’ Sam turns to look at Cas over his shoulder with one of his trademarked worried puppy eyes.

Cas moves his eyes away from her and nods in response to Sam’s question.

‘She has only fainted out of exhaustion. They are both all right.’

 _Both._ Dean clenches his jaw.

‘The lights… That was not me,’ goes on Cas turning to Dean now. ‘I thought it could be her. I felt something getting closer. But she has not that power, nor the child.’

‘Wait… What?!’

´Cas, why were you signing?’ asks Sam, attempting to command some calm on Dean through his rational tone.

The eldest is driving top speed under the heavy rain towards their selected motel.

‘I am not sure myself.’ The angel frowns a little. ‘I felt the song. It wanted… demanded to be sang, so I voiced it. It was like… I wanted to. And then I could not stop.’

There is a moment of tense silence.

‘Man, you _can_ sing!’ says Dean after several thunders.

‘But of course,’ replies Cas sounding a little bit offended, ‘I am an angel. Music is rooted in my nature; it belongs in my very Grace.’

Sam glares at Dean when the expected sassy remark doesn’t come. It takes all his willpower to hold the snort that comes when he sees painted on his brother’s face, as clearly as if it was floating on a cloud over his head, how Dean is mentally picturing all the angels he has ever meet bursting into singing and throwing killer moves. Then it hits him.

‘Where did the music came from?’

‘Uh?’

‘Yeah, it didn’t come from the speakers, right Cas? I felt... a change, and then you moved.’

‘It was at first,’ answers the angel, his eyes back to the woman by his side, ‘and then it was not: it was in the air.’

Dean and Sam glared at each other and then to the tiny unconscious girl with the huge belly through the mirror.

 

‘The song was edited.’

‘What do you mean?’ Sam turned to Dean over the light of the candle.

His brother has been sitting on a chair on the other side of the room in tense silence, gun over the table, while Sam shielded all the entrances with a salt line and took other standard precautions. The power was not back yet when they checked in the motel, so they were given some candles, as well as an apologise for the inconvenience that they awkwardly accepted.

The woman is lying on one of the beds, still unconscious, with a blanked over her wet clothes given that none of them had dared to remove them. They have looked through her stuff for documentation or anything that could identify her with no luck. They will have to wait for her to wake up.

‘I know that song Sammy, and I am a hundred per cent sure it has been messed with, shortened. It is mostly the instrumental parts, especially one whole by the middle.’

‘Are you saying that someone wanted us to… to hear Cas sing?’

Dean lets his eyes fly to Castiel, who is sitting on the side of the second bed, his eyes attached to the girl.

‘Man, I don’t know’, he huffs in frustration passing his hand through his hair. ‘That was weird even for us. And that means weird as fuck.’

The girl makes a muffled moan and moves a little. Sam rushes to her, Cas already standing but showing no intention of getting closer, and Dean drops his hand on the gun, frowning slightly.

She looks alarmed when she opens her eyes and her glare instinctively roams the room with the gleam of someone knows what she is looking for. It lasts just an instant, until her stare falls on Sam’s face first and then on Dean’s, and she sights with relief.

‘Good morning,’ says Dean harshly, it is still pitch black outside. ‘I believe you have a story for us to go with your dramatic entrance.’

‘You are the Winchesters, aren’t you?’ it is really not a question.

Dean raises an eyebrow and closes his hand over the gun. The eyes of the girl follow his action.

‘Dean, I strongly believe that is unnecessary,’ Cas points with his rough voice, taking a step forward.

The girl winces and nails on him a glare of distrust to which the angel answers without blinking, looking somehow eerie under the candlelight. Dean lets the gun go after sharing a glance with Sam.

‘I was told you can help me,’ she goes on with determination after putting her wide-open eyes away from Castiel with difficulty, ‘my baby is in danger. Someone wants to hurt it!’ she starts shaking a little, but manages to get hold of it before it goes to bad. ‘Can… Can I have some water, please?’

Sam is quick to bring it and kneels on the floor by her side.

‘Thank you,’ she says weakly.

‘What’s your name?’ he asks softly after she has drunk a few sips.

‘Grace, Grace Hoffmann.’

Cas tilts his head a little, but nobody notices.

‘Hello Grace. My name is Sam and that is my brother Dean.’ He gives her his most comforting smile although he is still wary about her. ‘We are going to do everything we can to help you, ok? But you need to tell us what’s going on and how I it that you know about us.’

‘And how you found us,’ points out Dean making very obvious his distrustfulness although his hand is anywhere near the gun since Cas spoke.

But Grace doesn’t look at him, staring at Sam with adoring tired eyes like if he was glowing like the sun.

‘Someone whispered it to me.’

Dean could have drilled a hole on her with his stare, but Grace doesn’t seem to notice and takes another sip of water.

‘Thank you,’ she repeats to Sam. Obviously she really needed it. ‘I know how it sounds, but that is what happened. I have been running away for many months now, the baby is due in days,’ Sam barely holds from looking back to his brother with an expression of alarm, ‘and I thought… I thought it was over. And then I felt this warm breath on my ears and I heard your names, I could see both of your faces clearly, you were in that bar, and then I could see the bar and the traffic signs around it, and I knew exactly where it was. Then the voice spoke again: _Go to them, they will not refuse you. They will save your baby, it's what they do_ ’.  She makes a pause and shivers, like if the memory is unsettling. ‘I hitchhiked as far as I could, and walked the rest of the way.’

 ‘That’s… a very comforting explanation,’ says Dean sarcastically, but his eyes fall on her soared purplish feet, whose rawness is obvious through the wasted shoes. ‘What makes you think your baby is in danger?’ he asks softer. He has bought it.

Grace steals a fast glare to Castiel.

‘That is Castiel,’ says Sam reassuring. ‘He is a friend.’

‘The voice didn’t mention him…’

Sam looks up at Cas for a second. For some reason Grace completely trusted that voice… or maybe the hope it had brought to her.

‘It is ok. Believe me. You can trust him your life.’

Dean looks at Cas and sees him lift his head a little at Sam’s words… Surprise?

Grace sighs with resignation.

‘Can I have my bag?’

Sam hands her the small but heavy bag that Grace carried over her shoulder when she broke into the bar. She starts moving her legs a little in a nervous manner while looking eagerly among its contents until she finds a small and cramped piece of paper that she stretches carefully with her fingers and hands to Sam.

‘About nine months ago I started randomly seeing this in my dreams.’

For the first time Dean gets closer to the scene. Cas stretches the neck a little form the other side of the bed to have a look. What Sam is holding is a creepy drawing of an eye with some whirly things coming out of it and three dots under one of the sides.

‘Then the _dreams_ began,’ went on Grace. ‘Vivid dreams where I saw things… good things and bad things. Not things that _will_ happen, but things that could happen and on which I could act thanks to what I learnt from those dreams. Like… I dreamt that my supervisor was run over by a car and then, the next day, it almost happened, but I remembered it and pushed her out of the way just in time. Or… I dreamt that there was a very expensive bracelet lost under a tree at the park I use… used to walk by, and when I went in the morning it was there. The dreaming made everything a lot better for a while… It was like if I could control my luck.’ She made a pause caressing her belly a little, her legs still making a subtle nervous dance. The colour of her voice faded a little as she went on: ‘Then I started seeing it. The very instant before falling asleep... Dark silhouette standing in the corner of the room, looking at me with huge glowy golden eyes... I thought it was my imagination.’

A shiver runs up Dean’s spine, but he makes no comment.

‘I found out I was two months pregnant, and Hell broke loose. It was the most inconvenient thing that could have happened… I had barely any control over my life to manage bringing a child into this world.  And my husb-… He didn’t want the child; especially now that I have got such a useful “talent” we could enjoy. He implied…’ Grace shakes her head a little to change her trail of thought. ‘And that night I dreamt I was in a room and that there was a written document in there, with that symbol on the top. I read it. It told me not to worry and stay in control, that I will keep my gift and that the child will be gone after birth. I woke up, and that shadow, just for a second, was standing by to the headboard of my bed, looking at me.’ She snorted in an ambiguous way. ‘To cut it short: I ran away. No one would help me at home, so I ran away. But I couldn’t leave _it_ behind, my dreams were gone but that thing always found me… It is there almost every time I wake up, so I don’t get to sleep that much.’ Grace makes another pause and swallows with difficulty. ‘I am sorry but I need to use your restroom.’ 

 Sam emits an inarticulate sound of surprise at the anticlimactic turn of the conversation, and Dean raises his eyebrows so high that they almost touched his hair (or so they felt). Before they can recover, Castiel’s offering hand is already extended towards the girl. She doubts for a second before accepting it and then the angel helps her up, using his free hand to push softly the small of her back, not letting her go until she’s reached the door of the bathroom, which she closes after taking the candle Sam is handing her. He stays at that very spot by the door, and Dean wonders whether he should tell Cas how socially inappropriate that is or not.

‘What do you think?’ whispers Sam.

Dean lets himself fall sit on the bed.

‘That we should probably drop her at the nearest hospital. She seems real bad, look at her, she can barely walk. Plus I am not sure we can handle the impending special shipping.’ Sam’s expression tells that he feels the same. ‘But they can’t really help her there.’

‘We do believe her then.’ Sam looks relieved. ‘Good. But I am worried about that whispering voice… And that this doesn’t seem to throw any light on Cas’ musical episode.’

Dean takes the paper piece with the drawing from Sam’s hands and looks at it under his frowned forehead, turning it around and back.

‘Have you seen anything like this before?’

Sam shakes his head.

‘Cas?’

‘No,’ answers the angel.

‘It looks… I don’t know. It rings a bell somewhere, but I am not sure…’

‘Maybe we can send it to Garth and see if he or anyone knows something about it,’ suggests Sam taking out his phone and starting the camera.

A thunder roars outside. The door of the bathroom opens, but Grace doesn’t walk out. The candle falls on the floor, setting the cheap moquette on fast fire. Dean and Sam look up at her and follow her frozen gaze to the dark corner of the room, where that ridiculously tall and slender shadow is standing, in perfect stillness, looking at them with glowing golden eyes with no pupil. Another thunder. Sam pulls the knife put of his trousers and jumps on his feet while Dean jumps to retrieve his gun form the table, but Cas is already there throwing a blow of his angel blade that goes straight through the shape without harming it. Without stopping, the angel uses the impulse to turn around and attack with his left hand that has begun to glow, but the shadow is gone before he can reach it.

With a sudden flicker the power comes back.

‘The Hell was that?!’ Dean roars surprising himself by how infuriated the sound comes out of his mouth.

That was not a demon, nor a ghost; it looked like nothing Dean had seen before. Yet the echoes awakened by the yellowish eyes, the fire, and the baby in danger electrified his body in a physically assumed urge to protect. He feels overly aware of Sammy behind him, who is now trying to put out the small fire by stamping it.

‘It seems you have quite an interesting story yourselves,’ says Grace with a quiet voice letting her hands find Sam’s back and hair when he kneels to pick up the candle, her eyes stuck on Castiel, who is examining the odd gunpowder looking dust that covers his right sleeve.

‘Dude, you can bet we do.’

 


	3. The Game: Dragon Attack

‘Do we have anything?’ Dean walks in the all-day breakfast while putting his phone back into his pocket and sits by Sam on the booth.

A confusing mixture of books, paper napkins, phones, breakfast and laptop covers the rectangular table. After the incident last night they decided to leave the motel, but not after Castiel had, after much insistence on his part and some vague explanations from the boys about the “special abilities” of their friend, performed a full health upgrade (“bring relief” he said) on Grace, showing particular concern on her wounded feet and general malnutrition. The girl had categorically refused to be helped into sleep though, so even when she looks a lot better now, her eyes remain wide, open in an owl-like manner.

‘Nothing,’ replied Sam closing the book loudly. ‘You?’

‘Nope.’ Dean grabs the mug of coffee, certain he will need at least another, and eyes around for the waiter to order some bacon and, maybe, another slice of pie. ‘Garth has asked around but nobody seems to have seen that fugly thing before. He is going to get himself to Bobby’s books though, so he may give us something later.’

‘Did you ask him about the music?’’

Dean glares over the mug at Castiel, who is staring politely, yet, intrusively at the girl sitting by his side, who is surfing through galleries on occult symbols with Sam’s laptop.

‘Music?’ asks Grace turning his attention to Dean.

‘Long story,’ he answers. And then to Sam: ‘No, I think we better keep that to ourselves… for the moment.

Sam seems to be about to say something but his phone vibrates vigorously on the table with an incoming call. He looks at it. Hidden number. He picks up and, before he can put the thing on his ear, the speaker spits a multitude of tentacles of black smoke that expand at top speed all through the ceiling of the restaurant and down on the people before any of them can react. Castiel stands up just half of a second before an angel blade is pressed hard against the back of his neck by the just-possessed person sitting in the booth behind theirs. The boys are frozen in the act of getting their weapons out: the whole of the people in the restaurant has stood up and is staring at them, still and possessed.

‘Easy there, tiger,’ says an amused familiar voice.

‘Crowley,’ growls Dean through his clenched jaw.

‘Nice to see you too, Princess.’ Crowley walks out of the kitchen with his usual place-owner casual nonchalance. ‘By the way, I don’t recommend you the chicken today; I am persuaded to believe it is not chicken.’

‘How did you do that?’ asks Sam looking alternatively around and to his phone, every muscle of his body in tension.

‘Oh, you know me Samantha, I am one for improvement.’ He stops to examine curiously the food left abandoned on one of the tables. ‘Our R & D has had a flurry of inspiration lately… Or, rather, I have worried myself that they had one. It is amazing how much fake impossibility you can undercover when you give people the right… motivation.’ He half sits on the two people table in front of theirs. ‘This is indeed, a world full of wonders!’

Then his eyes fall on Grace and the boys can see how surprise and another very intense expression hard to read cross the face of the demon for an instant before getting masked behind one of mild amusement, all his attention on her though.

‘Oh, but what do we have here? I’d ask to which of you I should give my compliments if it was not obvious that nor of you can produce anything half as interesting… But, maybe, my former associate here, but that would be, indeed, a surprise.’ And to the girl: ‘That is a good thing though; it increases your chances of survival, trust me.’ Crowley makes a pause to let his words sink. ‘Oh, my manners! I am sorry darling, but I believe we have not been introduced. May I have you name?’ and gives the girl his most charming businessman smile.

‘Don’t…’starts Dean.

‘Grace,’ she says weakly, looking tiny, almost buried in the couch, with an expression between dreamy and confused on her face.

A very characteristic music starts playing, soft, but growing in volume. Dean, Sam and Cas, rise their heads a little, the first two exchanging a meaningful look while the last won’t move his eyes away from Crowley, who doesn’t seem to notice.  

‘Oh, Grace!’ says the King of Hell with mocking delight. ‘Quite charming, my dear, and you couldn’t have chosen a most fitting company: they are in need of as much grace as they can get. Please, allow me…’

  _… to introduce myself,_

All the demons in the room turn to look at him when the words leave his mouth as a song. Crowley himself seems utterly surprised and looks around, confused about the, now obvious, music.

_I'm a man of wealth and taste._

He frowns a little, and takes a hand to his chest while standing up.

_I've been around for a long, long year,_

Opens his hands, like grasping the room within them and then takes them to the lapels of his tailored dark jacket.

_Stole many a man's soul and faith…_

He questions Dean with his stare, but the hunter answers with a shrug and an awkward puzzled expression.

_Pleased to meet you!_

He offers his right hand to Grace, like if he was looking forward kissing hers…

  _Hope you guess my name_

… and smiles charmingly at her, although the smile does not reach his confused eyes.

  _But what's puzzling you is…_

 Sam clears his throat with such force that Dean looks at the table expecting that a piece of lung jumped out with it. The singer stops his song death, the background music already starting to change. The younger hunter is staring at Crowley with such a cold fury that Dean wouldn’t have been surprised if his old demon-blood junkie powers got reset as a side effect. Truth be said, Dean himself finds Sam’s stare scary... It seems to him that it comes from that part of Sam’s thoughts and feelings that, despite his disposition to “talk about feelings”, Sam has never allowed to leave the silent depths of his mind.

‘Aw, look at that,’ says Crowley with fake endearment. ‘It turns out that, after all, Sam Winchester is proud of being the final boss’ prom dress and is willing to defend his honour. Ok, I oblige.’ He concedes putting his hands away with a little smile as he turns around and walks a few steps away, following the cadence of the new music that comes in, looking suddenly very comfortable with it.

Dean frowns and glances at Sam again, who has lowered his gaze but not the rage in it.

‘Shut up Crowley. What the fuck do you want?’ barks Dean, feeling his fingers itching with the desire to grab his gun even when he understands how stupid that would be.

Crowley laughs musically and begins to wander, playful and elegant, between the tables, hands in his pockets and eyes on his impeccably polished shoes.

 _Adventure seeker on an empty street,_ he sings.

_Just an alley creeper, light on his feet._

_A young fighter screaming, with no time for doubt,_

_With the pain and anger can't see a way out._

He glances at the boys and shrugs a little with satisfaction.

_It ain't much I'm asking, I heard him say,_

_Gotta find me a future move out of my way._

He reaches the bar counters, turns to face the hunters, takes his hands out of his pockets and extends them to the front.

_I want it all, I want it all, I want it all, and I want it now,_

_I want it all, I want it all, I want it all, and I want it now._

He roars.

_Listen all you people, come gather round._

He makes a calling gesture with his hands and some of the demons standing closer, hesitant, approach him.

_I gotta get me a game plan, gotta shake you to the ground,_

              He swings his shoulders a little…

_But just give me, huh, what I know is mine_

              … and lets the move reach his hips in a contained way.

  _People do you hear me, just gimme the sign._

He lifts one eyebrow suggestively,

_It ain't much I'm asking, if you want the truth_

              … and touches his chest in a mannered way.

  _Here's to the future for the dreams of youth._

 

 The music stops abruptly and Crowley’s singing is interrupted by the three demons that walked closer when he called.

  _Is this the real life?_

_Is this just fantasy?_

Crowley stares at them in disbelief. They look terrified about it, but proceed as if they cannot help it.

_Caught in a landslide_

A low-voiced demon of from another spot of the room incorporates to the singing at that line.

 _No escape from reality_.

 Music starts playing softly, most of the demons are looking around trying to locate the source, and other four demons start singing along the next part.

  _Open your eyes,_

_Look up to the skies and seeeeee…_

One of the singers steps on a chair and soloes:

_I'm just a poor boy, I need no sympathy,_

The rest of the singers answer, looking progressively more and more afraid:

_Because I'm easy come, easy go,_

_Little high, little low_ ,

And then the soloist:

_Any way the wind blows doesn't really matter to me, to me._

 Crowley and the soloist stare at each other for a moment, and then the King of Hell gives a heavy sigh of resignation, reaches into his jacket, pulls out a vintage silver gun and shoots the soloist in the middle of the forehead, throwing him from the chair on the floor. A strangled cry escapes from Grace’s mouth. Then, he casually sits himself on the counter and starts singing again, with feeling.

  _Mama, just killed a man,_

              He takes out a handkerchief with his initials embroidered…

_Put a gun against his head,_

              … and cleans the muzzle of the gun with it.

_Pulled my trigger, now he's dead._

Then he rests one of his feet on the stool, points the gun towards his mouth, like a microphone, and continues:

_Mama, life had just begun,_

_But now I've gone and thrown it all away._

He steps up on the counter with a very elegant move. His gun now turned into a real mic.

_Mama, ooh,_

_Didn't mean to make you cry,_

_If I'm not back again this time tomorrow,_

And then he lets the mic, which has spontaneously grown a holder, go so he can extend the arms, hands half-closed, very heartfelt.

 _Carry on, carry on as if nothing really matters_.

He gives a wide smile to the boys and then tilts his head a little, listening to the coming-from-nowhere music with an evaluating attitude. Then goes on, holding the mic dearly.

Lights start going down. Dean and Sam look around in full alert only to find that the demons near the windows are slowly closing the blinds.

_Too late, my time has come,_

A line of demons begins to gather before the counter, forming a chorus that faces the hunters.

_Sent shivers down my spine,_

_Body's aching all the time._

Crowley swings from side to side, very controlled, like dancing with the microphone’s holder.

_Goodbye, everybody, I've got to go,_

A white mist begins to cascade on the floor from the behind the counter, which seems to grow taller all of a sudden.

 _Gotta leave you all behind and face the truth_.

The outside light is now as blocked as it can get and, out of nowhere, a red and green stage lightning snaps on, making Crowley look very pleased.

_Mama, ooh_

_any way the wind blows_ , adds a chorus of demons.

_I don't wanna die,_

_I sometimes wish I'd never been born at all_.

 Dean realises he is holding Sam’s sleeve so hard that his fist is shaking, mouth half opened, barely capable of blinking. Sam seems to have frozen with his hand half the way somewhere towards Dean, but his eyes are still cold under his frown. Then, a motion that doesn’t come from them makes them stand up abruptly. Crowley looks at them with curiosity and two of the closer demons seem to ponder whether or not they should attack them; but then a white spotlight is on them and the words escape the brothers’ mouths with one voice:

  _I see a little silhouetto of a man,_

_Scaramouche, Scaramouche, will you do the Fandango?_

 They stare at each other in panic. For the first time since the place got infestated, the expression in Cas’ face changes from absolute focus on the blade on his back into one of subtle surprise. Grace stares at them with wide eyes full of sleeplessness.  

  _Thunderbolt and lightning,_

_Very, very frightening me._

Answers the whole room of demons (but Crowley) with one voice, at the same time that the colour lights flash like inebriated.

  _Galileo,_

              sings the demon poking Cas with a ridiculous Helium voice.

_Galileo,_

echoes Castiel, with his normal speaking, yet surprised, rough low voice, starting a little in surprise.

_Galileo ,_

_Galileo,_ they repeat.

 _Galileo Figaro,_ they conclude at the same time

_Magnifico!_

Exclaims Grace with astonishment, and her voice is prolonged by all the demons in the room.

  _I'm just a poor boy and nobody loves me._

The line brings in a new soloist, who jumps on a table while looking at his boss in alarm.

The rest of the possessed room answers:

_He's just a poor boy from a poor family,_

_Spare him his life from this monstrosity_.

Crowley raises an eyebrow, but shakes his hand in an old-fashioned way, like giving them permission to go on.

 

_Easy come, easy go, will you let me go?_

_..._

 The demons go on with a complex arrangement of choruses matched by the lights, which go crazy again; the floor of the restaurant filled now with white mist. The boys won’t listen though, because suddenly Crowley jumps carelessly from his “stage” and walks to them overwroughtly through the swirls of white mist.

‘Loved your party, boys,’ he says when he gets by their side, ‘we need to do this more often. And the _canapé_ were exquisite! (I will make my chef contact Deana for the recipe).’ Then his face goes serious, ‘but this is far too weird, so I am going to take my leave, tastefully, before I find myself singing “Somebody to love”. I don’t know what on earth is going on here but I will let you deal with what you are full hands groping now, there’s always a tomorrow. Especially when you are powerful… and immortal. _Au revoir_ , sexies.’  

And, with a snap of his fingers, the King of Hell disappears from the venue... But the singing demons do not.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you saw what I did there. About everything.


	4. Imagine Dragons: demons

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Dean pushes Grace behind him as he realises that some of those bitches seem to have noticed him in spite of the seriously macabre show his brother is pulling. The Hell…? He clenches his jaw and focus on the impending menace, trying to push back the raw fear of his brother that begins to pulse out of that dark corner of his mind in which he tenaciously keeps it locked beneath all his love for him."

In the instant Crowley disappears, the eyes of Dean and Cas meet. Without a word or a second thought the angel ducks and Dean pulls out his gun and shots the demon holding the angel blade, which is pushed back enough to let Cas safely turn and blow him out in white light. Instantly Sam passes Dean by jumping over the table, Kurd knife in his hand, and places his huge body between them and the still singing demons.

Dean moves to follow him but, before he can take more than one step, Castiel lifts Grace from her sit and pushes her against him.

‘Take care of her and the baby,’ he growls vehemently on his breath staring straight into Dean with his intense blue eyes for the fraction of a second. And turns to Sam: ‘I am going to get paint,’ and zaps out in a flutter of wings.

‘What?!’

Dean holds Grace to keep her from falling after the less than delicate drop as he points with his gun to one of the closest demons, who is looking at them evaluating the state of things and, given the smile that scars his borrowed face, seems to be partial to get himself some fun. Sam doesn’t give any sign of having heard the angel. There is a moment of perfect stillness, and Dean realises that a new melody has been growing against the one accompanying the demons since Crowley left.

_I was born of the womb of a poisonous spell,_

             Whispers Sam with a quiet but hissing voice.

_Beaten and broken and chased from the land,_

             Part of the singing demons stop and turn in their direction. The first melody has disappeared, the air now owned completely by the one playing for Sam’s words.

_But I rise up above it, high up above it and see._

             All the demons in the restaurant are staring at them now. Dean swallows feeling how his throat ties itself in a knot, glaring alternatively to Sam and the crowd.

_I was hung from the tree made of tongues of the weak_

             Sam begins to walk forward slowly.

_The branches, the bones of the liars, the thieves_

_Rise up above it, high up above it and see._

‘Sammy…?’ asks Dean warningly and perplexed.

The demons are moving forward, slowly and wary about the musical situation, but closing a deathly trap around them. Dean, with the warm tiny woman pressed against him, feels the spat of danger ran through all the nerves of his body, only kept from being distress by the quiet undefined hope that Castiel will come back and zap them all out.

  _Pray to your God, open your heart,_

             cries Sam moving teasingly close to the demons within the circle they have set around the hunters.

_Whatever you do, don't be afraid of the dark_

             He turns, eying them all, a strange pulse growing in the way he moves. The hunter eyes glow again with that cold fury with which he had looked at Crowley before. Dean can see how the smug smile is melted away from the face of many demons under that stare.

_Cover your eyes, the devil's inside!_

             He smirks. It is not a real smile; it is more an excuse to let his teeth show. And something about it makes the demons react: some of them step back and some of them tense completely ready to charge.               

             Sam jumps forward, almost unnaturally fast, and slays the throat of one of the beasts who was about to jump at him. The stage lights go all green, the room gets filled with screams.

  _One night of the hunter_ ,

             he howls, turning around in one move to stab the chest of the one that was about to jump on him from his back. He sings with surprising power… Intensely, his voice fills the room.

_One day I will get revenge._

             Sam pulls out the weapon from the thundering body and ducks a blow from a third demon, in woman’s body, which claws at him. The hunter kicks her back enough to straighten up and dispose of a new attacker by stabbing him up his jaw.  

Dean shots at the possessed girl, pushing her further back.

_One night to remember._

             Sam kicks a chair to the floor, making trip and fall another demon that was getting closer, which gets shoot on the head as soon as the hunter pulls out his own gun with his left hand. He turns again, just in time to stab on the chest the possessed girl with Dean’s shot hole on her forehead, making her drop the table she was carrying to hit him with on the top of a by standing demon.

_One day it'll all just end, oh._

             He takes a step back, glaring at the demons, and cleans out of his singing mouth the blood that has splashed his face with the back of his also bloodied hand. The demons hesitate. 

Dean pushes Grace behind him as he realises that some of those bitches seem to have noticed him in spite of the seriously macabre show his brother is pulling. The Hell…? He clenches his jaw and focus on the impending menace, trying to push back the raw fear of his brother that begins to pulse out of that dark corner of his mind in which he tenaciously keeps it locked beneath all his love for him.

  _Un, deux, trois, cinq_ , mutters a female demon among the possessed crowd.

             Sam jumps towards her; the other demons rush back and open a way for him.

_Blessed by a bitch from a bastard's seed,_

             the hunter keeps on singing. The demon is in a short brunette girl with long messy hair big eyes, and Dean does not want to think about it at all. She looks scared, but stares at him defiantly.

_Pleasure to meet you, prepare to bleed._

             Sam stabs her, Dean can’t really see where, and he turns before the way opened by the demons closes behind him.

_Rise, I'll rise, I'll rise._

             He shoots and cuts, and he is back between Dean, Grace and the demons again; the white mist on the floor, now green under the lights, curls around him, like following his macabre dance.

              The demons are not getting closer to him now. Sam opens his arms teasingly, as he swings on his long legs dramatically.

_Skinned her alive, ripped her apart,_

_Scattered her ashes, buried her heart._

             He walks the circle opened around him, one hand closed hard around the knife, the other around the gun, his arms soaked in blood.

_Rise up above it, high up above it and see._

 Dean notices that some of the furniture starts shaking, pointing that the demons may be getting tired of the physical approach and, in spite of the distraction, may be finally snapping out of it. But Sam strides through the crowd, jumps on top of the table of a booth opposed to the one in which they were sitting before, and turns to face his “audience”.

_Pray to your God, open your heart,_

             he goes on ferociously opening his arms like making an offering.

It is the first time he can see his brother’s face since he started singing, that Dean can see his expression, and it is deep and unreadable, which makes Dean feel utterly uncomfortable as it brings to surface everything about his brother he has made his mind to ignore.

_Whatever you do, don't be afraid of the dark._

              Sam swings a little on his hips, and then smiles bitterly before adding:

_Cover your eyes, the devil's inside…_

             … and jumps back to the floor, cutting through a demon as he lands.

The abruptness of the gesture helps Dean snap out of it on time to shoot a demon that has resolved that he and Grace were also worthy targets. He pushes her back trying to make some room between the attacker and them, hopefully towards the door. The action grants him the attention of more demons.

  _One night of the hunter._

_One day I will get revenge._

_One night to remember._

_One day it'll all just end, oh._

 Sam stabs and shoots his way through possessed bodies, flying chairs and tables, with choreographed precision, and he is back to Dean’s side, soaked in demon blood, but compulsively cleaning his mouth on every chance. He closes lines with his brother.

  _Honest to God I'll break your heart,_

_tear you to pieces and rip you apart._

             Whispers Sam repeatedly with closed eyes.

 In the meanwhile, two of the demons, one who has been shot before, charge against them. Dean slows one down with his gun and is about to jump to the front to physically break his charge when Cas materializes in between them and grabs the two demons by their faces. Suddenly the green stages lights disappear.

             Sam emits what to Dean sounds like a prolonged howl.

There’s fear in the demons eyes. Probably because the angel is back, but Dean would not rule out Sam’s scary howl so fast. Dean can see the confusion in their eyes when they try to leave their vessels and, to his surprise, they can’t.

‘Ready,’ says Cas looking to Sam over his shoulder for a second before turning to the one demon who was trying to get hold of the angel blade on the floor.

Sam opens his eyes, takes a deep breath and, on the top of his voice, yells:

 

_Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus_

_omnis satanica potestas, omnis incursio_   
_infernalis adversarii, omnis legio,_   
_omnis congregatio et secta diabolica._   
_Ergo draco maledicte_   
_et omnis legio diabolica_   
_adjuramus te._   
_Cessa decipere humanas creaturas,_   
_eisque aeternae Perditionis venenum propinare._   
  
_Vade, Satana, inventor et magister_   
_omnis fallaciae, hostis humanae salutis._   
_Humiliare sub potenti manu dei,_   
_contremisce et effuge, invocato a_   
_nobis sancto et terribili nomine,_   
_quem inferi tremunt._   
  
_Ab insidiis diaboli, libera nos, Domine._   
_Ut Ecclesiam tuam secura tibi facias libertate servire_   
_te rogamus, audi nos._   
_Ut inimicos sanctae Ecclesiae humiliare digneris,_   
_te rogamus, audi nos._   
  
_Terribilis Deus de sanctuario suo._   
_Deus Israhel ipse truderit virtutem_   
_et fortitudinem plebi Suae._   
_Benedictus deus. Gloria patri._

 

Everything shakes for a moment. The demons twist, and shake, and complain with roars and screams, as their vessels are forced to vomit the smoky tentacles that constitute their material trace; and then they swirl a little bit more, rebelliously, before getting swallowed by the beneath along with all the scenic effects.

Is it past noon and the four of them are sanding in the middle of a silent restaurant full of unconscious people and butchered corpses. Dean shakes a little and Sam is covered in blood.

 

‘Je te crains comme le diable,’ whispers Grace in her breath, from within the tight protective embrace of Castiel’s arms.


	5. Run away: Carry on

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ‘That was touching,’ mutters Grace in silly awe in the moment the singing stops abruptly, her voice sounding funny.  
> ‘Shut up!’ roars Dean a little high pitched, clawing the wheel, blushed like a sunburnt tomato, while Sam swallows noisily and tries to make his body improbably disappear in the seat.

They stumble their way out of the venue at top speed. Dean almost dragging the drunken-looking Grace, gun still in the hand around her waist, while looking in his pocket for baby’s keys with his free one; Sam literally stripping out of his bloody plaid button up, which he proceeds to make a ball that throws to Cas, who follows close behind. The angel takes it on the fly and the shirt is instantly carbonized between his fingers.

As they get into the parking area, Dean notices two open cans of white paint by the Impala. He sees drops of white paint on the sleeves of Castiel’s trench coat when he takes the weight of Grace from him so he can unlock the doors. The hunter looks around while Sam surrounds the car to jump in his shotgun place and Cas helps the girl in the vehicle, covering her head with his hand to prevent her from banging while getting in. He notices a trail of paint tracing a curve and some straight lines between them and the all-day breakfast; he narrows his forest green eyes, frowning when he recognises the pattern of the pentagram of a devil’s trap. A huge devil’s trap, all around the building. 

He jumps in the car and starts it at once, driving out to put as much distance as he can between them and the venue before the whole thing explodes.

 

‘So, since when you and Cas hold master tactician sessions behind my back? I think I missed the episode when you two became best-dudes-forever,’ spits the hunter unceremoniously, trying to give some kind of way out to the tangle of emotions that seem to be eating him alive.

Sam, who is sprawled, breathing hard, staring at the ceiling, turns to him with a hint of surprise mark on his scowl.

‘It is not…’ he starts, sounding a little offended, but then he seems to change his mind and goes on calmly, turning his face to look out the window: ‘It was not really a plan, it is something we pondered. We have had a couple of conversations about our progressive carelessness for the life of the hosts taken by the demons we kill, and about which were our real options about it if we were to survive… But we never polished it enough to think of it as a plan. Never mentioned it because there wasn’t chance.’

Cas remains silent and Dean keeps his eyes on the road, not looking at either of them.

‘Well, it worked awfully great as a plan… Smart you Cas,’ he adds wryly.

‘Thank you, Dean’.

Dean can feel the twitch of his eye.

There is a whole minute of silence.

‘Is it true what Crowley said?’

‘What?’ Sam raises an eyebrow sceptically.

‘That you feel proud. Of being… Lucifer’s vessel.’

‘What the f…! Dude. No!’ replies the younger in disbelief, straightening violently on the seat.

‘Really? Because to me it looked like you had decided to show them who the boss is. Man, that “unleashed beast” you just pulled in there…’

Sam snorts with anger and shakes his head, turning to face the window again.

‘I was pissed off, ok? I just… could not hold it. Crowley was giving himself importance by brushing on my face…’ It seems that the words drown in his throat, run over by the others that want to come out. ‘I am the one who knows, who truly knows… And what Crowley is, is not but a mock of what _he_ is. And it is not something to toy with’. He pushes his jaw forward and puffs loudly. ‘It is not about playing importance, but I am the one who really knows the extent to which that’s true. Those thoughts he had, his whole logic, I know them too well… We damned shared a brain, and now those are mine now to deal with. And, frankly, I want to leave all that behind, I want myself out of all this perverse mechanism in which it doesn’t matter what I do or how hard I try, I am always wrong, I am always a fool, always doomed to fail. Maybe I am not the right soldier for this war, maybe I am making it all worst with all this trying; but it has never seem to be any way out, so the only thing left to do was pushing forward. But now I _know_ I there is.’ And, after a bitter pause he adds: ‘He used to sing that, you know? After the wall fell, in my head’.

‘Yes,’ confirms Castiel.

There is a silence that lasts several kilometres.

‘And what’s with all the singing?’ growls Dean

‘Bite me if I know!’ answers Sam equally annoyed.

‘Was that normal?’ whispers Grace from the backseat, her voice sounding drunk.

‘Only the part in which the demons try to kill us,’ replies quietly Cas.

‘Oh… And are these two always this tense? I hope it is not my fault, I don’t like making people upset’

 ‘No, they have been like that since I came back. We were apart for a while so I am not sure what happened between them, but I am not asking because Dean has a hard time opening up and Sam has been very distant too. I think… the three of us have a lot to regret’.

‘Dude, we are _just here_!’ Complains Dean with his sassiest voice inflexion, and looks at the angel through the rear-view mirror for the first time.

Grace has her head on Cas shoulder, slightly beaten, like a doll sitting wrong, but her eyes hugely open and restless. For a second Dean seems to see something on her face…

  _"Looks like I've lost my will to carry on, my friend" she said_

 Dean turns to Sam, eyes wide with disbelief. His brother is looking out the window with a rapt expression, as if remembering, his forehead resting on the glass. He doesn’t seem to be aware that he has started signing… again, even when the coming-from-nowhere music began to play like an answer to his words. This time is nothing like before, all the fierceness and power given up; he is singing softly, to himself, like a purr.

  _And you can hear it in my whispered cries for love._

_I need your blissful touch to carry me away again,_

_So can we roll tonight, roll through your desert, can we start over and just..._

 Dean considers stopping the car, he should want to stop the car, and realises that, for some reason, he does not want to.

_Run away, run away tonight_ ,

              goes on Sam.

_It aint no victory, but I don't care, I don't care if it's wrong or right_

_We can just run away, run away tonight_

_It aint no victory but I don't care, I don't care if it's wrong or right._

 Dean only realises that he has joined the song when Sam seems to snap out of it and turns to look at him piercingly. The hunter feels his blood pounding at his face for a moment, then leaving it completely, and finally gathering all in his ears. Then he goes on singing alone:

  _"Looks like I've lost my will to carry on, my friend" she said,_

              the worlds come out sweetly form his mouth.

_I'm like a posse that's been ridin' for days._

             He gets now what Cas meant about not wanting to stop… He didn’t want to sing, especially such a thing! But something in the flavour of his breath in his mouth as he articulates the words feels… Good. Not good as in something pleasant, but… Good-good. Like real good. Like when something falls effortless on its place, on the place it should and wants to be, and there’s no need to put a fight.

_I've got the scars to prove that love has had its day and its way with m_ e.

             He feels a twinge of panic at nudity of what he is singing, which was transmitted into a slight tremor in his voice. He fixes his eyes on the road as the words keep on pouring delicately (more than he is comfortable with) form his mouth. But Sam’s voice joins in and catches him, livelier, on the next line:

_So can we roll tonight, roll through your desert, can we start over and just_...

Sam turns his face to the window once more. He can see Castiel’s face on the side mirror; he is staring at Dean with a dazzled expression that makes his blue eyes seem to glow. He lets his sight wander beyond the car as his voice carelessly spills, singing along with Dean’s.

  _Run away, run away tonight_

_It ain’t no victory but I don't care, I don't care if it's wrong or right_

_We can just run away, run away tonight_

_It ain’t no victory but I don't care, I don't care if it's wrong or right_

 Something in the voice of his eldest brother fills him with an aching nostalgia he can’t place or handle, breaking his own voice a little into something scraping yet clear, but deeper.

_This ain't no night to be on your own._

             He knew that Dean had a beautiful voice when he really wanted to sign, but he had forgotten that he could sing so delicately. He hardly ever did.

_You've got to know where you're coming from,_

             Sam could recall very few occasions, when he was younger, before Stanford;

_To know just where you're goin', Lord._

             Dean would sing like that when he thought himself alone and was not paying attention to the fact that he was singing. Then a whole unexpected repertoire, so out away from his usual style that Sam could not believe he knew, would come out, distractedly, with his breath… They were plenty of lullabies among those.

_You've got to know where you're coming from_

             But Sam doesn’t want to think of all that now, so he almost yells the next part to push the thought away:

_This ain't no night to be on your own_

_Run away, run away tonight_

_It aint no victory but I don't care, I don't care if it's wrong or right_

_We can just run away, run away tonight_

_It aint no victory but I don't care_

_I don't care I don't care I don't care I don't care_

 

‘That was touching,’ mutters Grace in silly awe in the moment the singing stops abruptly, her voice sounding funny.

‘Shut up!’ roars Dean a little high pitched, clawing the wheel, blushed like a sunburnt tomato, while Sam swallows noisily and tries to make his body improbably disappear in the seat.

‘We need to stop somewhere.’ Castiel’s voice comes death-serious from the backseat, ‘Grace’s body is about to start taking damage for the prolonged vigil.’

‘I won’t sleep!’ she complains way too fast.

‘You have to. The baby will get hurt too if you don’t.’

Dean looks at Cas in the mirror, surprised by the softness in his gruffy voice. Cas is holding Grace’s hand against her huge belly and looking vehemently in her eyes.

‘Ok, why not?’ he concedes. ‘We don’t really have a plan anyway. And Sam could do a shower.’

 

Dean parks the car on the side of the reception of the motel and jumps out to get a room. To his surprise Cas and Grace step out of the car too. Dean is not sure who is following who, but they stay there; Sam has the good sense of keeping his covered-in-blood-self inside the vehicle. When he gets to the reception and asks for a double room, the clerk, a middle aged man whose head’s hair seems to have fallen to go land on his upper lip in the form of thick, bristly moustache gives him a sceptic look.

‘Double?’ he asks pointing at something under the counter.

Dean peaks over the table to find the small screen of a poor quality security camera that is showing the parking area, his car in the corner, with Grace and Cas resting against one of its sides.

‘Oh, that’s my w… My little sister.’ He says with his most charming smile, which is very charming and he knows it. His first impulse had been to say “wife”, but something stirred painfully inside him at the thought. ‘And her husband.’ It seemed to him that Cas really looked like a husband, standing there with all his reassuring angelic presence for the pregnant girl to rest her weight against his side. ‘He is a dick,’ he adds out of impulse throwing a knowing look to the clerk. ‘The thing is that we driving to our parents’ place for the delivery… you know, she is almost due and wants… mum to be there.’ Why do painful things keep on coming to his mouth? ‘But she’s not feeling well, so we are taking a couple of hours break for her to rest. A double room will do.’

The clerk nods understanding and gives him a sympathetic smile as he turns around to look for the keys in the locker behind him while muttering something about his wife’s pregnancy, motion sickness, and some other husband stuff. Dean pretends to listen while still staring at the screen: Cas seems to be saying something to Grace, she nods a little and move her face away, facing straight to the camera. Dean feels like if someone dumps a bucket of freezing-cold water on his back…

‘Son?’

‘Uh, what?’ he snaps back in reality. ‘Sorry, got distracted.’

‘Uhm.’ The man gives him an evaluative glare. ‘I was asking if the baby is your first nice or nephew.’

Dean feels a different kind of cold taking over him, but manages to force a smile out which, for some reason, is genuinely shy.

‘Yes, yeah. The first one.’

The clerk smiles a little bit under his huge moustache and hands him the keys.

‘All the way left, son. And try to get some sleep yourself, you seem to need it.’

Dean doesn’t remember what he mumbles as an answer as he barely holds himself from running his way back to the car. The image of Grace in the screen had no eyes, but two huge shadowy black holes.


	6. Storytime

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dean opens the door with his free hand and, in less than a second, the bags he was carrying fall on the floor with a loud broken sound. The light of the sleepy sun has pierced an opening in the shadows, revealing a body lying on the cheap rug by the bed like a broken doll.   
> ‘Sam! Sammy!’  
> The hunter rushes in the room, his gun appearing in his hand, and falls on his knees by his little brother. Dean turns Sam´s huge body and a sound he never knew he could make leaves his throat when the eyeless face of his little brother turns to him. It is not that his eyes have been gauged out, they are simply not there, replaced by dark misty holes that ooze a dark dust. Sam´s head looks like a mask nobody is wearing, which given their historial is disturbing at more levels than the fair ones.

When Dean rushes back to the car Grace looks at him with bright, sleepless, and perfectly healthy eyes so, in spite of Cas’ questioning stare, he decides to shut up about it until he can talk to the others in private. He gives a wave to the security camera before getting back in the car.

Given that they don’t know which creature they are facing, the Winchesters fill a duffle bag with wide-range monster blocking and killing gear to take in the room with them. Cas is almost carrying Grace when they walk in, and makes her sit on the closer bed as soon as he can. She doesn’t lie down, but sets herself in a more comfortable position with her back resting on the pillow and the headboard; Cas helps her the pillow of the other bed and places it under her feet. Sam closes the curtains brusquely and, after glancing at Grace and Castiel, he dashes to the bathroom hinting an eagerness to clean himself he has been efficiently hiding. Dean takes a chair, placing the bag on the next one, and quietly starts extending their arsenal on the table.

 

When Sam comes out of the bathroom, fully dressed but still rubbing his hair with a towel, Grace is still stubbornly awake caressing her belly in silence with one hand while holding it with the other; she smiles a little to Sam when she sees him and he returns the smile awkwardly, she is pale like a ghost, and he knows what he is talking about. Castiel is still standing by her bed, in tense silence. There’s a half empty glass of water on the side table. The man glances inquiringly at his brother and Dean snorts quietly, looking down the barrel of the gun he is cleaning.

‘She won’t sleep, and Cas won’t make her,’ summarises the hunter curtly. He seems to be satisfied with the weapon and spans it close with a vigorous shake. ‘Maybe you can explain me what’s with this love triangle thing going on between the three of you,’ he takes a shotgun from the table.

‘The _what_?’ Sam takes the remaining chair, throws the towel on the table, and proceeds to help his brother revise the equipment.

‘Yeah. Cas is stuck to her like glue,’ he says casually, ‘and she seems to be fine with it… expect that she does not lose sight of you…’ Dean lifts his eyes from his work for the first time to give his little brother a teasing look that Sam does his best to ignore, even when he is a little taken aback.

‘I don’t know about that, but Cas…’ he looks towards the angel for a moment and frowns a little before turning his attention to the work at hand, ‘I think he may be thinking of his family, I mean, of Jimmy’s family: Am… his wife and Claire.’

Dean stops his work death and stares at Sam with huge, perplexed eyes.  

‘I don’t know man,’ goes on Sam, in answer to his brother’s silent question, ‘I am not an expert, but I think he is doing a pro job (maybe a little too intense) at taking care of a pregnant woman… And I don’t think he has much personal experience on the field.’

Dean stares across the room, the angel is staring back at him with his always undefensive vibrant blue eyes, probably hearing their whole conversation clearly through their whispers. So many questions crowd into Dean’s head that he fails to identify any of them. He doesn’t really think about Jimmy anymore, he has not bothered to ask whether he is still there or if he died in one of those times when Cas… It is not that he does not care! But it is easier not to think about the man. Yet… He learnt a little about how it was to be an angel’s meat-suit from Jimmy, he could even ask Sam if he had the courage to do so, but he had never asked in which ways an angel is affected by their vessel (which they obviously are) and what kind of relationship they share with them. If Sam is right… Why would Cas care so much about something that is only a memory from Jimmy’s life? The fact is that, regardless how tense he seems, the angel could indeed pass for the father of Grace’s baby; there’s definitely a longing in the way he looks at her, and a spark of something else Dean can’t read. He knows Cas has nowhere to go back to but, funny enough, he very much look like someone who belongs in a family; Dean just realises that he has this family vibe all over him, probably always had. He doesn’t really get it but…

… Cas breaks the eye contact to stare at Grace. Only then Dean notices the music.

  _Talk to me softly._

_There is something in your eyes,_

              she whispers, staring at her belly while caressing it.

_Don't hang your head in sorrow_

_And please don't cry_

 Grace doesn’t seem to notice that she’s singing. Her sleepless eyes deeply lost on her prominent tummy with a pained expression, contradicted by the sweet smile outlined on her mouth, which glowed with a secret joy. Dean feels the goosebumps all over his skin. There is nothing outstanding about her voice in technical terms, but there is something overwhelming about the warm and vulnerable way in which she articulates the song as a lullaby that goes straight through him… Like if the song was for him... which troubles Dean, because he knows it is not. And he looks at the poor, wasted, defenceless Grace, singing comfort to the one whose existence has led to the ruin of her life, to the one she could have gotten rid of and nobody would have noticed, who may never know or understand what she went through, and he feels the weight and flavour of the word “mother” on his tongue. It comes together with a powerful and definitely masculine attraction and allure towards the tiny woman; that thrills him deeply.

  _I know how you feel inside, I've_

_I've been there before._

_Somethin is changin' inside you_

_and don't you know_

 Dean turns to look at Sam, whose expression is dark and impenetrable until he feels Dean’s stare and turns to him with one of shared perplexity.

_Don't you cry tonight,_

_I still love you baby._

_Don't you cry tonight,_

_don't you cry tonight._

_There's a heaven above you baby,_

_and don't you cry tonight_

Then the music changes fluidly into something more energetic.

  _She's got eyes of the bluest skies_

_as if they thought of rain,_

              comes in Castiel.

The angel is facing Grace, but has his eyes closed and his head a little bit turned away. He also sings softly, although his fists and frown are intensely closed, making a dramatic contrast with the music that accompanies his song. Somehow it is like the voice is coming from far away… which matches perfectly the unearthly something that resonates beyond the acoustic range allowed by Jimmy’s vocal cords.

  _I hate to look into those eyes_

_and see an ounce of pain._

 Once more, the voice is very different from his speaking one, beautiful in a way that makes Dean want to take shelter and Sam feel tiny. The tune is familiar but, like when Grace sang, it comes across like something completely else, like if the lyrics are meant and old brand new, instead of performed.

  _Her hair reminds me of a warm safe place_

_where as a child I'd hide._

 Dean can see how his brother’s face has broken into one of his signature puppy eyed expressions that, proven, can get through the toughest adversaries (which is a lot to be said of it, given their record) and, for some reason, he feels left out.

  _And pray for the thunder_

_and the rain_

_to quietly pass me by_

 Grace is the only one who doesn’t seem to be bothered by Cas’ voice. Instead, she is staring at him, with bright eyes and a wrinkle of recognition painted on her frown. And she takes in breath to follow the angel’s song, low and warmly, on the last part:

  _Oh, oh, oh,_

_sweet child o' mine._

_Oh, oh, oh, oh,_

_sweet love of mine_

 

Castiel’s voice becomes progressively distant until it can’t be heard anymore and, for a long awkward moment, nobody says anything.

‘Ok. That makes it,’ bursts Dean while loading the shotgun on his hands with a loud snap making everyone startle. He then puts the weapon on his younger brother’s hands and looks intensely into his eyes: ‘if anything by Justin Bieber comes out from my mouth: shoot me. Point blank. On the head. Doubt and I will make you regret it.’

‘Do you know any song by…?’ starts Sam teasingly, but Dean ignores him and stands up.

‘I’m sick of this. We are going to look for spells, hex bags, tulpa sigils, haunted accessories, or anything among our stuff, because whatever is making this is obviously following us. And I don’t think it has to do with Grace because Crowley seemed to know something about her case and was as surprised about the Broadway breakout as any of us, except he didn’t get to see Cas go Michael Jackson.’ He walks towards the door. ‘Cas is coming with me, we can use his angel radar. Sam stays and makes sure that the overgrown Anti-Sora does not come uninvited while we are out. And we will grab some grub.’

‘Dean, I…’ starts Cas looking uncertain.

‘Is ok,’ says Sam walking towards him with a grave expression, ‘I will take care of her. Promise. But it will be a good idea if you helped her sleep.’

‘No…!’ begins Grace weakly, looking alarmed, but Sam has already kneeled by the bed and takes her hand.

‘It will be ok, Grace. I will be here all along. You came to us for help, please, let us help you.’ And he gives her one of his _Sam Winchester’s reassuring smiles_ ™.

She doubts.

‘Promise me you will be here,’ she tells to Sam pressing his hand back.

‘Promised.’

She smiles weakly and looks up to Castiel.

‘Can you make me sleep?’

‘Yes. But I won’t unless you want to.’

‘“Special skills” is starting not to cover the things you can do,’ she points out with an edge of distrustfulness on her voice.

Castiel exchanges a glance with Dean, both surprised that she is still alert given her state.

‘Don’t worry,’ she adds with a sigh and closes her eyes, ‘I won’t ask about it. After all you are the ones doing me a favour, you don’t owe me anything.’ She presses Sam’s hand again and lowers herself on the bed. ‘I am so scared for my baby that I am forgetting to be thankful, I’m sorry.’ Then she opens her eyes and looks back at the angel, still holding Sam’s hand. ‘Please, help me sleep Castiel.’

 

Dean and Castiel left Sam on the room and, after registering thoroughly the car and all the stuff they carried within without finding anything, they drove to the closest dine, which happened to be farther than Dean expected. They end up buying a ton of stuff, unsure on what Grace could or would eat, and when they take the way back to the motel the sun is starting to set. Dean tries to keep a light conversation all along (about the case, about pie, about random stuff on the road), but Cas is quiet even for Cas, so he ends giving up while he drives back in the perfect silence of the by-all-means-shut-up radio.

‘You like the girl,’ he says after a while, realising that he can’t really stand the angel’s quietness. Not this kind of “muteness” at least.

‘Indeed.’

‘Man, had I known you have a thing for preggie girls I would…’ he starts teasingly, but has to stop to hold a snort due to the “I am not sure I am getting what you mean Dean, but if this is going where I think it is you better take your chance to shut up now” stare that Cas gives him. ‘C’mon, I am kidding man. She’s cool. She’s tough for someone so tiny.’

Cas nods slightly.

‘I find her touching,’ says the angel, and Dean has to bite his tongue to keep himself from taking the chance to make a childish joke out of it, but Cas’ next words kill the playfulness in his mood. ‘And the baby too. The baby loves her with such fearlessness is overpowering…’ 

Dean presses his jaw and fixes his stare on the road.

‘It makes you uncomfortable.’

It is not a question, and Dean is tempted to pretend he has no idea what Cas is talking about, but he changes his mind after a glance to the angel.

‘I guess. Not sure why.’ He makes a pause, ‘but I swear that if I have to sing about my feelings one more time, I’m gonna…!’

Dean turns in disbelief at the soft tickling sound of Cas’ quiet laugh and puts his best effort looking aggravated for the rest of the trip.

 

They drive in the parking of the motel. The sun has fully set by now, although there is still sunlight in the sky, enough to reflect on the windows and hide the thick darkness inside the room. Dean opens the door with his free hand and, in less than a second, the bags he was carrying fall on the floor with a loud broken sound. The light of the sleepy sun has pierced an opening in the shadows, revealing a body lying on the cheap rug by the bed like a broken doll.

‘Sam! Sammy!’

The hunter rushes in the room, his gun appearing in his hand, and falls on his knees by his little brother. Dean turns Sam´s huge body and a sound he never knew he could make leaves his throat when the eyeless face of his little brother turns to him. It is not that his eyes have been gauged out, they are simply not there, replaced by dark misty holes that ooze a dark dust. Sam´s head looks like a mask nobody is wearing, which given their historial is disturbing at more levels than the fair ones. Dean pulls Sam against his chest, getting a slight relief through the adrenaline rush when he feels a heart beating strongly against him, and then he sees it: the glowing golden eyes with no pupil, staring straight into his eyes, in perfect stillness, from the darkness under the bed. The thing is less than a meter away from them, and it is not lying on the floor, but holding itself to the under part of the mattress with its claws.

He growls something and jerks back trying to drag Sam’s impressive weight with him as he raises the gun, but the thing dissolves in whirlwinds of dark dust that spread within the darkness of the room with a somehow singing sound. Dean looks into it trying to find a target to shot and then something golden gleams. It is like fireflies… or like the eerie flashes you see when you close your eyes too hard. The hunter blinks urgently, trying to clear his eyes when he feels the soft sting that is making him squint.

  There is a big room, and the gun is in his hand, but there is nobody there. It is dark, but not like the darkness before. It is gentler… Cosy, maybe. If all his hunter senses were not urging him to kill something, Dean could have consider how much it reminded him to that particular shadowiness under the covers of Lisa’s bed in an early Sunday’s morning, when he would wake up an instant after the sun, with his face buried in her belly, and pondered whether going back to sleep or get down to the kitchen to make waffles for her and Ben. But he wants to kill something, and turns around on his spot looking for a target; the shadow recedes softly, like if someone lighted a candle. Now Dean can see the walls of the room. They are made of blocs of stone and they look very, very old, but for the carvings, those look new. Every inch of the wall is covered by them, and they look rough and unrefined… like if they had been made just by scratching, without the right tools. It is writing… is the same thing over and over again. Dean doesn´t know how he can tell because every caving is written in a different script and he can’t find any among them that he knows. Yet, he can read it.

‘Pa… sithea?’ he whispers out loud.

And then he realises that Grace is lying on the floor at his feet, peacefully asleep, and that the homely glow comes from the thin golden dust covering her.

There is a jolt and Dean is back in the dark room. He is lying on the floor with one arm closed tightly around Sam’s back. His eyesight is blurry, like if he just woke up, so he rubs his eyes with his free forearm realising that he has dropped the gun at some point. Before he has the time to react, there is the sound of one single flap that makes the darkness move around him like if it was somehow fluid. He looks up. Cas is standing above him, leaned over, with a hand perched firm on his shoulder and his starry eyes fixed in the shadows through which he obviously can see something. Cas turns his face to one side. Another flap and a cloud of dark dust with golden bits is dispersed away from them.

Then Cas’ head jerks, his glimmering angel eyes stabbing their way up, and Dean´s sight follows. The unnaturally long shape is standing upside down on the ceiling, staring at him with intent. For a second Dean feels a wave of vertigo, like if he was the one with the wrong side up, and startles a little holding Sam tighter; but Cas’ hand remain steady on his shoulder, holding him in place regardless of which side is favoured by gravity, and Dean feels the forming knot in the pit of the stomach give away. The thing lowers one absurdly long arm to get it closer to the hunter’s eye level; the move of his hand leaves a trail of golden dust which light is swallowed fast by the dark cloud around.

‘Wait!’ he cries before Castiel can make a move, and he can tell the confused frown on the angel’s face like if he could see it, but he won’t move: there is something in that hand.

The creature opens his fingers, long like shadows and curved like claws, in front of his face. It opens them like if it was resting the hand on top of its content which, from Dean’s perspective (gravity-wise… probably), is like if those two pearly orbs covered in golden dust were resting on the palm. It takes him a moment to realise what he is looking at. He feels Cas’ grip on his shoulder get tighter and then Dean yelps, recognising the uncertain colour of his brother’s iris looking at him from that opened claw. His hand hopes for the gun, wishing he is on the right side of physics it has not fall out of reach, but before he can find it, the creature waves his fingers slightly and Sam’s eyes dissolve in a glittery dusk that pours and floats like mist, falling on his little brother face.

Sam tenses at once, and moves alarmed within Dean’s embrace. The older brother lets go a breath he has not realised he was holding when the darkness filling the younger’s eye sockets dissolve, making place for a wide opened pair of effective eyes. For a moment it takes all his strength to keep his Sam in place, but the hunter registers the situation rapidly and turns to the dark shape, still, but with his muscles filled with a dangerous voltage.

The creature pours to the ground in front of them like the sand of a clock, reforming head up from the smoke raised by the move. It waits in perfect stillness, like if it made a point and its turn was over. It is taller than Sam, and slender. All the edges of its body are sharp and Dean gets the vibe that they could pierce flesh as clean and easy as smoke. The face has no other features than the eyes, like a plain mask with no expression that projects slightly outward, making the hunter think of the beak of a bird. There could be hair, but it melts with the dark background. Actually, Dean is not sure how he can see all this cut out in the darkness of the room, but maybe it is because this thing is deeper than everything around him.

‘Do not interfere,’ commands a female voice.

The two men turn towards the bed and the angel lets Dean’s shoulder go to stand on his full height. Grace is laying on it, still, like if she was sleeping, but a dim glimmer gives away that her eyes are open.

‘Grace?’ Sam sits up straighter, releasing himself from Dean’s grip. ‘Grace, are you awake?’

‘She is not,’ growls Cas behind them so low it makes the room vibrate slightly.

Grace sits on the bed. Her move is a fluid move, but somehow abrupt, mechanic… which looks very odd with her big tummy. She turns her face to them, her eyes frozen open like a porcelain doll.

‘Do not interfere,’ she repeats as expressionless as before.

‘Well if you ask it all nicely like that…’ Dean´s hand finally finds his gun, grabs it and points it to the creature which is so still it could be a fidget of his imagination. ‘Let the girl go.’

‘No,’ replies Grace.

‘What do you want from her?’ snaps Sam in a calculated tone. ‘Why are you after her?’

‘I mean her no harm,’ answers Grace once more, turning mechanically to sit on the edge of the bed.

‘Well, then you have been doing a really, really lame job stating your intentions, sunshine. Epic failure if you ask me.’ Dean stands up slowly, still targeting the creature that stands before him. ‘She was more dead than alive when we found her.’

The dust surrounding it stirs, producing a hiss like the one of a serpent, and the hunter wonders if maybe he has pinched a nerve.

‘I have kept the others away. But the time is close now. I will take what is mine’.

‘Dude, maybe if you were a little less cryptic we may be able to… I don’t know, get what the hell you’re saying!’ The only thing that keeps Dean from shooting is his certainty that it would be useless, not only the thing has passed through all their standard defences twice, but also he saw how Castiel’s angel blade went through its body without causing any harm: the regular bullets in his gun stand no chance.

Sam stands up by his side and gives his brother a meaningful glare, that Dean can only see thanks to the faint light that makes it through the open door, before turning to the creature.

‘Calm down everyone. We are talking, talking is good.’ He makes a small pause in which he looks at Grace for a moment. ‘Somnus.’ The creature tilts its head slightly, reacting for the first time, and Grace mirrors its move. ‘That is your name, right? I read it… In my… Er… dream.’ The creature’s shape shifts completely towards Sam with something that could be seen as alert… or curiosity. Sam tenses but goes on. “I get that you want to keep Grace safe, isn’t it? You could have hurt her… and me, when out took me out, but you didn’t. You are always there when she sleeps, right? I think you are taking care of her. We want the same thing Somnus, we are not your enemies,’ he says with his warmest and most conciliatory voice gesturing at them with his huge hands, maybe a little too eagerly. ‘She came to us for help, but we can’t help her if we don’t understand what’s going on.’

The creature stares at Sam for what seemed an hour. Then the music hits in, and the shape dissolves in a swirl of sand, the eyes the last thing to spark out, transmitting the movement to the pond of shadows that fill the room and making them swirl, only to reappear just behind Grace an instant before melting with the shadows. The girl stands up like if someone was pulling her up from invisible strings.

  _It was the night before,_

_when all through the world,_

             breaks in her voice. She takes her hands near her heart and then pushes them out like if she was about to cast as spell. Her posture is affected, such as an exaggerated stage actor or a puppet modelled after a singer.

_No words, no dreams,_

             she shakes her head and then leans forward, as one who is going to share a secret.

_then one day:_

  _a writer by a fire_

             She lifts her hand, waving it a little, and a cloud of golden dust appears around it and takes the shape of a flame.

  _imagined all of Gaia_

_took a journey into a child-man's heart_...

 Dean feels a shiver coming up his spine. Even when it _is_ her face, the simple but mechanically efficient way in with she moves and her unblinking eyes trigger the alarm of all his hunter senses; she looks like one of those automatons he has seen in old movies, and those never ended good. It takes all of his will power to lower the gun. The voice however… The voice is alive, but sounds… double, like if there were two of them singing the same song at once.

  _A painter on the shore_

             She wipes the golden flame with one gesture of her hand, leaving a dust trail that takes all sorts of tiny shapes that glow like fireworks: ships, horses, trees, small cars...

_imagined all the world_

_within a snowflake on his palm,_

             The glow of the many figures extinguishes and they disappear when she extends her open hand, like if she could see something on her palm.

  _Unframed by poetry_

_A canvas of awe_

             Grace turns on her spot, looking up, and some little bits of gold twinkle around her for a second …

  _Planet Earth falling back into the stars_.

             … before falling like drops of light.

  _I am the voice of Never, Never Land,_

             Her voice goes oddly wilder and her pace changes. Her motion becomes vigorous in a way the hunter does not think is possible for a woman about to give birth, as she moves around the room with technical perfection, like dancing with the misty shadows

  _the innocence, the dreams of every man_

             Dean sees Sam, concern written all over his face, take a step forward in alarm just in time to stop him.

  _I am the empty crib of Peter Pan,_

             Sam glares him a complaint and turns to Cas for support,

_a soaring kite against the blue, blue sky,_

             but Cas seems to be overtaken by the song and doesn’t notice. His head is slightly tilted, his frown a little crossed, and his eyes move around in the inquisitive way in which they move in those unnerving moments when the angel is getting something the Winchesters don’t.

_every chimney, every moonlit sight,_

_I am the story that will read you real_ ,

             Both brothers turn to look at the woman again…

  _Every memory that you hold dear._

             … but Dean won’t let go Sam´s arm.

 Then she stops and face them, making eye contact with her glassy eyes, approaching them, all her body language mimicking the one of a great story teller about to get to the most intense part of her tale; like if she was about to tell them a long promised secret. And she whispers:

  _I am the journey,_

_I am the destination,_

_I am the home,_

_the tale that reads you._

_A way to taste the night,_

_the elusive high._

_Follow the madness,_

_Alice you know once did._

 The shadow of the creature cuts out again behind her, taller and sharper than before.

  _Imaginarium, a dream emporium!_

_Caress the tales_

_and they will dream you real._

_A storyteller's game,_

_lips that intoxicate._

_The core of all life_

_Is a limitless chest of tales_...

 ‘Fuck…’ escapes in Dean’s breathe.

Sam looks at him. But, before the hunter can even get proper hold of the pieces that are falling into place in his head so he can voice it, he hears the growing second layer of music intruding with the first one, as a reminder, and he is not even surprised when that is followed by a shiver up his spine: his skin feeling Castiel´s voice before it reaches his ears in a whisper.

  _Hush little baby, don't say a word_

_and never mind that noise you heard._

_It's just the beast under your bed,_

_in your closet, in your head._

 Sam turns to look at Castiel with such an expression of alarmed surprise that, if Dean had been paying attention, he would have feared his eyes could fall out of his face again. But Dean’s stare is glued in the shadow behind Grace.

  _Exit light!_

             Goes on Cas, his voice starting to overpower Grace´s

_Enter night!_

             A kind of golden electric wave travels through the misty shadows of the room, changing half of the dust in the room into glowy golden.

_Grain of sand!_

             A faint “oh” of understanding escapes Sam´s mouth.

             Grace drops her own song and joins the angel for the last line at the same times that the golden eyes of the creature appear behind her.

_We’re off to Never, Never Land!_

 

‘The sandman’, states the hunter, staring back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The monster is undercovered!  
> I hope you are enjoying this so far, I m enjoying writing it.
> 
> Also, about the musical sound of the sand I keep mentioning in this chapter, I really recommend you to have a look at the audio linked here, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singing_sand . It is beautiful!


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